It is known in the prior art to provide a vehicle interior with a knee bolster assembly that straddles the steering column at a location below the steering wheel and generally on a lower portion of the instrument panel. The knee bolster is designed to absorb the impact of the occupant's knees during a forward collision as a means of supplementing seat belts and other occupant restraints.
One such prior art knee assembly is shown in FIGS. 1 and 2. During a frontal vehicle collision, the driver's knees 1 contact an outer knee bolster trim panel 2. The trim panel 2 transfers the load to a relatively heavy metal outer knee bolster 5, which constitutes a significant percentage of the weight of the knee bolster assembly 7. The knee bolster assembly 7 includes an integrally formed energy absorbing main bracket 8 constructed from sheet metal. The main bracket 8 includes two side bracket portions 3 being open facing the driver and integrally incorporated with a central bracket portion 4. The outer knee bolster 5 is positioned between the trim panel 2 and the brackets 3 for covering the bracket 8. The assembly 7 is mounted to a rigid steering column bracket 6. As shown in FIG. 2, the knees 1 load the outer knee bolster 5 which transfers load to the central bracket portion 4 and the side bracket portions 3 which buckle about a single predetermined bend line for absorbing energy.